Louisville/Jefferson County Metro, KY : 2018 Champion Cities

Deploying Drones to Help Police Officers Investigate Crime

Approximately 765,000

Greg Fischer

Mayor

Directly Elected Mayor

Type of Government

4 years

Length of Term

Safety

Issue Area

The Problem

Louisville’s homicide rate has spiked in recent years and is now double its 10-year average.

The Idea

The City of Louisville will build on a recently installed gunshot detection system to dispatch aerial drones in the seconds after shots are detected — winning valuable minutes that will allow police to capture critical evidence from the crime scene to aid investigations.

What Mayor Greg Fischer is saying:

The Mayors Challenge is looking for bold and innovative solutions to urgent problems, and our proposal, which combines new technologies to improve public safety, accomplishes just that.

Louisville will test the feasibility of using autonomous drone technology combined with ShotSpotter gunshot detection. They will use role playing to test how their idea will be integrated into first responder methods; and will test public receptivity for this idea through workshops.

Ideas into action

What we're discovering through testing

In a session with stakeholders and residents to feedback on their idea, the team’s assumptions were challenged. Participants were concerned about privacy and trust of ShotSpotter in their neighborhoods. As a result, the team is adjusting the way in which they communicate, to ensure they are transparent. Following a suggestion from a stakeholder meeting, the team are now thinking about how they can facilitate these neighborhoods to set up drone businesses.

The team didn’t receive Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) clearance to use drones in the city limits. So, they had to get creative. They collaborated with the University of Kentucky and a drone company to simulate several scenarios for testing with residents.

There’s got to be a component where neighborhoods affected have economic opportunity to participate in the solution.

Grace Simrall, Chief of Civic Innovation and Technology

Reflections

What we've learned

The test and learn phase uncovered trust issues between the community and police, which are more deep-rooted than the team previously realized. Residents were concered that the idea is merely an enforcement response, which benefits police. This concern led the team to re-prioritize the metrics they are using to measure success as well as the way they are communicating their idea. Now, their focus is to use drone technology to attend to gunshot victims to improve emergency response capability.

[This process] has opened people’s eyes to the efficacy of communication with the community.

Grace Simrall, Chief of Civic Innovation and Technology

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